New York yoga teacher Natasia Pelowski reveals why her parents allegedly hired kidnappers to snatch her from room as a teen

A New York woman has claimed that her parents hired a pair of kidnappers to snatch her out of her own bedroom and take her away for 53 days.

Natasia Pelowski, a New York City-based yoga teacher

A former troubled teen has described her harrowing account of her parent-hired alleged kidnapping that brought her to a wilderness therapy camp where she claimed to have been abused and forced to lay in an open grave.

Natasia Pelowski, a New York City-based yoga teacher, recalled the morning she was woken by a pair of boots pounding outside her door in before bursting into her Silicon Valley bedroom on November 23, 2014, reportsThe New York Post.

The then-16-year-old came face-to-face with her eventual abductors — two strangers, a male and female — whose figures were “so tall and wide they filled my doorframe,” she wrote in an essay from her point of view published by magazineNewsweek.

“Come with us,” Ms Pelowski recalled them say before she shot back with “no” before freezing out of fear.

Natasia Pelowski, a New York City-based yoga teacher. Picture: natasiapelowski/Instagram.

“I wasn’t asking,” the man said as he grabbed the arm of the small teen who said her life was being taken away.

The high school junior screamed for help as she was tackled to the ground before she was handcuffed and carried downstairs, where she claimed they were greeted by Mr Pelowski’s mother.

The female kidnapper revealed only her mother could stop the abduction, but the teen allegdley only got the word “sorry” mouthed from her parent as she was dragged out of the home and into a “cold, black car”.

Ms Pelowski’s high school principal had recommended a wilderness therapy program as her parents were convinced that having their daughter “forcibly removed” from her home was an effective way to get her there.

The teen, who struggled with depression in high school, spent 53 days at the camp without electricity or shoes, repeatedly stripsearched, prevented from speaking to her peers and forced to work in fields.

Natasia Pelowski told Newsweek her parents had her kidnapped and brought to a wilderness therapy program in 2014. Picture: natasiapelowski/Instagram.

Open grave

One harrowing morning, Ms Pelowski was woken by staff before sunrise, blindfolded and ordered to follow the sound of drums.

When she removed her eye covering, she was met with a 2 metre long open grave that she was laid into and read a eulogy to mark “the end of my old life”.

But Ms Pelowski’s nightmare didn’t end there.

After her time in wilderness therapy, she was placed into a Utah residential centre where she was placed in solitary confinement for 24 hours and the subject of “attack therapy”.

During her stay at the residential centre, Ms Pelowski says she witnessed several suicide attempts “followed by staff berating the attempters”.

She claims she developed PTSD following her release just before her 18th birthday.

“For 10 years, I struggled to understand how my family could have abandoned me. It’s always haunted me that children are still being subjected to brutal treatment programs like mine, she wrote.

Pelowski’s high school principal had recommended a wilderness therapy program. Picture: natasiapelowski/Instagram.

“I no longer blame my parents. Instead, I wonder why politicians who hold the power to save vulnerable youth fail to do so.”

Ms Pelowski admitted her forgeable abduction wasn’t unique as it is the most common method to get troubled teens to their respective facilities, which include private youth programs, therapeutic boarding schools, residential treatment centres, religious academies, wilderness programs and drug rehabilitation centres.

“Between 120,000–200,000 young people reside in some type of group home, residential treatment centre, boot camp, or correctional facility” with over 50,000 of them being placed there privately by their parents, according to an estimate by the American Bar Association.

“This corrupt network of juvenile mental health institutions known for abusing minors receives over $US23 billion ($A34bn) in public funds annually and holds over 120,000 to 200,000 minors at any given time,” Mr Pelowski said.

Natasia Pelowski said she received PTSD from the experience. Picture: natasiapelowski/Instagram.

The facilities, operated by private companies, non-profits or faith-based groups promise to help youth with behavioural problems, addiction, eating disorders and in some cases sexual orientation and gender identity.

Mr Pelowski isn’t the only one advocating against the controversial youth treatment, as others, including Paris Hilton, have put the industry into the spotlight.

In 2023, Hilton pushed for US legislation against the treatment, which she claims she was abused, specifically at the Provo Canyon School in Utah.

“This is still happening today at these places, and 200,000 children are being sent away to these places every single year,” she told Fox News at the time.

In April, she backed California legislature aimed at cracking down on the industry by requiring more transparency from youth treatment facilities.

California’s Accountability in Children’s Treatment Act was signed by Gov. Gavin Newsom and will go into effect on January 1, 2026.

This story appeared in The New York Post and is reproduced with permission.